FE rocker asembly

[rblong]

Well it did not take me long to get lost. A few of you advised I checked my valve adjustment while I am waiting on my pipes. No real problems but sounded easy enough and I have nevr opened a Ford. Pulled the rockers off and the attached pic is what I have. I have three different FE books but none of them tell me for sure which ones these are. As I mentoned when I bought this car I was a small block chevy guy and don't know Ford's. They mention regular adjustable hydraulic (like a SB Chevy), Non Adjustable hydraulic but the pics looks just like adjustable but appears they lock down rockers and then you use different length pushrods - they do not mention these (other than a few unidentified pics). They don't look adjustable to me so I am assuming you would test them like the non adjustable hydraulic? Is this a good set up. My engine is supposed to be a 428CJ. Any help to a Ford rookie would be appreciated.

Bruce

[Keithc8]

You have a stock non-adjustable rocker arm assembly. The only way you can adjust these is to shim the complete rocker assembly up with shims under the rocker stands. It is also important that the valves be leveled in the heads when they are assembled when a non-adjustable rocker assembly is used. This way you will have the same pre-load on the lifters with everything the same height. The other option is to get some adjustable rockers to use and then you can adjust each valve as needed. Good luck, Keith Craft

[rblong]

HMMM, Kinda what I expected, except I read nothing about the shimming. I personally don't like the idea, sounds like with the heads on I would have to take a height measurement of all valve stems, pushrods etc and if all equal shim for a particular preload on the lifters? How much preload? I might look into going adjustable. Thanks for the responce - I got some more investigating to do.

Bruce

[Excaliber]

"Back in the day" it was pretty easy to buy various length pushrods, which essentially is how you "adjusted" them. The old stock Ford pushrods were "color coded" for the different lengths. Probably impossible to find any these days. But with the hydraulic lifters it's not "that critical", if it runs good, aint making noise and the rockers are basically tight, let it go...

[RICK LAKE]

rblong Bruce Go out and buy a set of after market rockers, shafts and stands. If you go through some of the old threads like excalibers you will see what happened to him Look on ebay they have sets for sale all the time. Lookat Garrett machine setup there on the web. You want either full roller which is both ends or bushing ones on the shaft end. FE break end stands, has not happened to me but I upgraded to dove stands with the same system as yours. Hope this helps Rick Lake

[chuckbrandt]

If your cam is smaller than .550 lift and you don't have huge spring loads you'd probably be fine with standard adjustable rockers.

Dennis at DSC sells them complete for $260 and has options up from there

www.dscmotorsport.com

Chuck

[rblong]

You folks are great. I did find some aftermarket assemblies searching around last night. Car runs great, but I don't need no problems if you know what I mean. Think I will look into some adjustable.

Thanks again,
Bruce

[SFfiredog]

Is there a reason you feel you need to adjust the valves?
If I remember your engine was all done at around 5000 rpm on the dyno.
The stock rocker assy is more than adequate for this rpm.
It sounds like you have a stock CJ cam and by looking at your photo you have stock springs and retainers
There were thousands of 428CJ/SCJs, and probably a million 352/390s built with the same set up.
I wouldn't bother with adjustable rockers untill you upgrade your camshaft and other components.
You'd be better off spending money somewhere else first.

"If it ain't broke, don't fix it"

--Mike

[rblong]

As far as why I was going to check valves? It was suggested because of a cooler than all other #4 cylinder. It was running about 100 degrees cooler than all others. But your correct it don't seem broke cause it runs great and smooth as glass. I don't know cam specs, but was told it was one up from stock - has a slight lope, but nothing radical.

I am going to go ahead and button it back up since I have decided I am not going to immedietly do anything with the current set up. I am going to start gathering some infor as to changing over to adjustable though!

Thanks,
Bruce

[John Martin]

You may want to upgrade your eight rocker stands .